The 2nd Migrant Wave to Germany | 265 comments (265 topical, editorial, 2 hidden)

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

Because I don't think it's particularly healthy to grow a permanent underclass in society. But of course it depends on what kind of standards are applied.

_{Schengen is toast!}

by epochepoque on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:18:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

what have refugees to do with a permanent underclass? especialy with the permanent part?

by IM on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:27:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

I explained it up-thread. Low paying service sector jobs are the first port of call when you don't have a job lined up beforehand. There we'll have wage deflation simply because of supply and demand. Given how our system is rather bad at advancing people beyond the class they were born into (and the upper-to-middle class will do everything to keep it that way), this creates the potential for a sizable underclass. The more the merrier. This obviously wouldn't be that big of a problem if say, 80,000 came per year. But 800,000/year for a few years lands you in trouble. Also, let's just say it: race plays a role as well, not just being from the 'wrong' class.

Sure there will be success stories. But the downtrodden will go uncounted. Inequality will increase. The End.

_{Schengen is toast!}

by epochepoque on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:45:35 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

Perhaps the increasing numbers in the underclass you mention will eventually contribute to changing the class imbalance. This is probably why Germany is so open to middle class Syrians, but afghans and pakistanis not so much.

'The history of public debt is full of irony. It rarely follows our ideas of order and justice.' Thomas Piketty

by melo (melometa4(at)gmail.com) on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:50:56 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

Germany, i.e. the interior ministry, is open to Syrians because it's an active, massive warzone (everyone's a Syrian now at the border). Afghanistan and Pakistan have 'lower intensity' wars that don't engulf the whole country. Middle class or not doesn't matter when asylum requests are evaluated.

_{Schengen is toast!}

by epochepoque on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:59:29 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 1)

Most of the Syrians arriving now are skilled or highly skilled. Methinks you are too pessimistic.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 04:53:39 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

The barriers to entry such as the language, the German fetishim for the right certificates, the long period before you're allowed to work, are there even for the highly-skilled. And we don't know that it's just an exodus of the intelligentsia. Most likely, with the high numbers, it's a representative cross section of the whole of Syria.

_{Schengen is toast!}

by epochepoque on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 05:07:13 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 1)

The overwhelming majority of Syrians in the interviews I read were intelligensia, unlike the Afghans and Pakistanis.

The difference between the Syrians and the Afghans shows another way: the Syrians tend to have money to spend (at Keleti some could buy their own food) and that also shows in the speed at which they arrived (one interviewed claimed less than a week, most a little under a month of which a lot was waiting), while I read several Afghans telling about superlong walks. I read of Syrians coming from refugee camps in Turkey, one abandoning an exploitative black market job in Istanbul, but most came directly from Syria (after being internally displaced or directly from home). It seems most people in the hungering refugee camps in Turkey either don't have even the level of funds those Afghans had or don't yet have the same level of desperation to walk most of the way.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Tue Sep 8th, 2015 at 05:36:49 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

Typically refugees need a lot of money to get that far, and they need a knowledge of other countries, and a certain adaptability that is learned by dealing with information. The uneducated don't have all that, that's why they are usually stuck very near to their old homes.

by Katrin on Wed Sep 9th, 2015 at 03:23:54 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 1)

Emphasis on "usually": those Afghans walking thousands of kilometres are usually uneducated.

Meanwhile, I read another interesting article (in Hungarian) that gave a new insight on why most of the current wave doesn't come from the refugee camps in Turkey, in spite of the worsening situation there. The journalists travelled around the border, interviewing dozens of refugees both in and out of the camps. All of them seem to be hoping that eventually the situation will normalise in Syria and all but one wanted to return home (some even thought going to Europe is outrageous). I am thinking (this wasn't in the article) that one reason is that the Syria they left behind was less hopeless and destroyed than the Syria left behind by those emigrating now.

_{*Lunatic*, n.

One whose delusions are out of fashion.}

by DoDo on Thu Sep 10th, 2015 at 06:52:22 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Signaling Lessons, Hard Learnt (none / 0)

"The barriers to entry such as the language,"

not so hard for young people

"the German fetishim for the right certificates,"

true.

"the long period before you're allowed to work,"

three months?

by IM on Wed Sep 9th, 2015 at 04:02:50 AM EST
[ Parent ]

The 2nd Migrant Wave to Germany | 265 comments (265 topical, 0 editorial, 2 hidden)

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